Stair of the week actually looks safe; Too bad about where it's going.

Making good stairs is an important part of green design; you want people to use them instead of elevators in bigger buildings, and you want to get tighter, more efficient plans in smaller ones. We used to have a Stair of the Week featuring the most interesting ones, which were often deathtraps. In our tiny house posts, there are often no stairs at all, forcing people up and own ladders in the middle of the night.

That's why this stair in a Berlin micro-apartment shown on Designboom is interesting. The designers Spamroom and John Paul Coss only have 21m2 (226 SF) to work with, yet they squeezed in a straight run stair that certainly is narrower than code, but has a handrail for safety. The folded plate steel is minimalist and elegant. (Lots more photos in Designboom)

The problems start when you get to the top; I don't think that loft is more than two feet high. It looks totally claustrophobic to me. Getting out of bed, one would almost have to slither out on your belly feet first onto the stair.

The photographs look great, but I really wonder if it's time to reconsider the loft except in cases where you really have the height to do it right. This looks terrific, but is it actually usable? Having spent a few nights in the MiniHome's loft bed, and doing my share of slithering and head-hitting, I wonder.